Monday, November 14, 2011

James Nicoll raises the question of, in a less Earth-based Legion of Super-Heroes (such as one that exists out there in the galaxy right now and comes to Earth to recruit), what power would all Terrans share that would justify one being a member. Similar to how all Braalians, Carggites, Durlans, etc. have a common power.

Interesting discussion in the responses. The leader, in my opinion, looks to be our ability to throw things at other things. Doing so with any degree of accuracy, let alone having Tom Brady become Quarterback Lad, is said to be unique for humans among Terran lifeforms.

3 comments:

Braalians, Carggites, etc. are generally descended from Terran stock, with artificial evolutionary abilities added. So you shouldn't expect to see Terrans with an identifiable separate ability.

You might have better luck identifying something divergent between humans an Daxamites or Kryptonians, since they diverged farther back. What powers do humans have that chimps don't, and vice versa.

More interesting is probably when you get to human/Talokian/Coluan/Khundish. Looking at Tasmia current and past states, perhaps most humans have the emotional power to separate their emotions at death of a spouse, vs. Talokians. (Which then plays into Mother Memory and Talokian ancestor workship.) Emotional abilities could also maybe be seen to separate humans from Coluans and Khunds. Powers don't have to be physical manifestations or with flashy energy outputs.

Stuff like vampire stories, A Distant Soil, etc. indicate stuff about strong human auras and the like. So even there, maybe we just don't see the energy output that indicates our "power" so strongly to others.